Contributors

Aasem BakhshiAn Electrical Engineer by profession who always wanted to be a sociologist or a college teacher. Always wishing to be a book-a-day bibliophile, he is seldom successful in prioritizing things in life. He is good at nothing except escapism and meaningless meandering in cyber-sphere. His interests include religion, philosophy and subcontinental studies. Non Skeptical Essays is his personal blog. He is also a co-editor of PTH.

Abdul Majeed

Abdul Majeed is a medical student by Profession, with a passion for research and creating awareness. He is a committed “Liberal Fascist”(obviously in the way Hamid Mir understands it and not how Jonah Goldberg wants you to believe). He has written extensively about Zaid Hamid and about his own vegetarianism. His topics of interest include History, Political Economy and Sociology (in short, anything but Medicine!!). He blogs here and is Assistant Editor at Pak Tea House.

Aisha Fayyazi Sarwari is a new media professional who writes to create awareness of gender related issues in Pakistan.

Aneeq Ejaz

Currently pursuing Masters in English Literature at Government College University, Lahore. Occasional writer contributing fiction and non-fiction pieces to online and offline publications. Interested in urbanization, social development, environment and a sociological understanding of beliefs and behavior. Work in progress. Also, the co-editor of Pak Tea House. Contact.

D. Asghar

D. Asghar is a Pakistani American, physically away from Pakistan but mentally always roaming around the Sohni Dharti. A Mortgage Banker by profession, loves to write. To him writing is almost equivalent to breathing.

Farahnaz Zahidi Moazzam

Farahnaz Zahidi Moazzam is a freelance writer and editor with a passion for writing. Her focus is human rights, gender issues and reproductive health. She loves blogging, traveling, is a chaai person and a wannabe photographer. Her pet peeve is marginalization on any grounds. She lives in Karachi & blogs here.

A writer, blogger and journalist who currently makes his living as a technical writer. He edited several magazines and newsletters, in Pakistan and in the US. Amongst recent publishing credits are “Spider,” Pakistan’s Internet magazine and a cover story for the Siliconeer. He blogs at iFaqeer, WadiWallah, and Rickshaw and contributes extensively at Urdu-ke-Naam; and PakistanFutures.

In a world beset by internecine violence, this not so angry/young man has chosen to bury himself in the cheesy cultural smorgasbord that is Dubai. Following a lifetime spent mainlining faux western culture, he believes that he is now in a position to comment, from the safety and security of his dubious domicile, on things he knows little or nothing about, including the trials and tribulations of our good-for-taking godforsaken Land Of The Puritanical. He has been known to strut his stuff at mine kampf is your campfire and Poetry in Notion.

He has little to offer the world, save for a few bits of wisdom stolen from jum’a khutbas. In the meantime, Mozaffar is trying to purge himself of the assorted variety of Nifaq-nuggets he keeps finding in his system. Otherwise, he is completing a doctorate in Islamic Intellectual History. Mozaffar’s Moments is the personal blog of this contributor.

RHR is currently a PHD student in USA. He has been writing regularly for various internet publications including PTH, Express Tribune and Huffington Post. His interests include Pakistan affairs, reformation of religion and development disciplines. His believes in a tolerant and democratic Pakistan.

Soniah Kamal is an established creative writer. At college she received the Susan Irene Roberts award for her thesis based on Vikram Seth’s acclaimed ‘A Suitable Boy’. Since then, her short stories have appeared in various literary journals. She blogs at the blogger and Desilit, reviews books at ReadySteadyBook; and publishes a newsletter Peaks ‘n’ Peeves.

Waqas Habib

“Firm believer in democracy. Passion and writing are synonyms to me. Video production, BPO companies, theatre, event management and business makes me who I am. Violence through gun versus conviction through writing, let us see who wins.”

Yasser is a lawyer based in Lahore who is interested in writing, blogging and advocacy on the ground. Yasser believes in the secular and democratic vision of the Quaide Azam and strives to join citizens’ movements to fight obscurantism and absolutism. He is a co-editor at PTH.

Zia Ahmad

ZiaAhmad has until now sold his soul to advertising, sitcoms, offshore call centers, and cold, heartless retail chains. Along the way he redeemed himself with an MA in Film from Kingston University. He is prejudicially fond of films, listens to music that radio stations play late at night and has read all of Kurt Vonnegut. Zia is currently stationed in London.

Asim Khan

Break the Clutter to save the beauty of the city

We live in the 21st century, we call ourselves conscious human beings but less do we realize that as the world is progressing, we’re turning from human into consumers. Everything we are related to, is being commercialized, our food, our water, our events, our festivals, even our feelings and emotions. Less often do we realize how our surroundings are changing? How there is a big difference in the environment we grew up in, from what we have around us today? I want to bring up and highlight the problem that how these conventional Billboards and OOH ad vehicles have grown so out of proportion to destroy the natural beauty of our cities. Almost everywhere we look while we are on the road, we are exposed to some sort of billboard, poster or ads on vans (even rickshaws) and etc. while on my way back from work, I once grew curious as to how many ads do I get exposed on an 8km long road from my home to work (single trip)? I counted; there were around 26 billboards, 51 posters and 8 wall chalked ads.
I’m concerned how these billboards and ad vehicles are destroying the natural sight of the city, by just imagining a quick look of the same place, back in time compared with how it looks today with more than a dozen billboards standing around traffic signals, following you along the road and even visible from the balcony or the terrace of your house. The reason is not only because there are more brands and products to sell in the market, but the fact that OOH advertising mediums have increased with time and corporations target to attack the consumers attention as much as they can and wherever they can, the latter motive is however a problem as companies compete to put their ads everywhere so that the consumer is bombarded with the same message again and again and again… this causes a spike in demand for Billboards which leads to putting up of more of them to accommodate the demand.
This in turn creates visual pollution and causes distraction especially for car drivers for eg. At Baloch colony bridge there was a significant increase in accidents when an interesting billboard was put , portraying real life people hanging on the billboard in an attempt to have the chocolate being advertised, purpose achieved, audience engaged BUT at the wrong place where they had to pay the price for being engaged with the brand. Many such cases have been reported especially in relation to attractive, eye-candy lawn ads around the city. Coming back to the point, at the spread of these billboards is adversely affecting the natural beauty of the city. Trees and greenery going into the background of these billboards and some trees being pulled down to put up new billboards. Some places to name in Karachi are Karsaz, Shahrah-e-Faisal, Various main roads in North Nazimabad and Gulshan and etc. which were green and open places, now invaded by billboards. Advertising clutter! So much so that there are needless ads here and there just for the sake that “there would be at least be someone who could be influenced by the ad”.
Advertisers and Marketers need to realize the importance of effective and creative communication rather than the run-of-the-mill messaging. The objective of these marketers should be to engage with the right audience, at the right time at the right place rather than everywhere, all the time and with everyone which just makes the ads a part of the clutter. Instead of creating visual pollution, focus should be on making the maximum impact without destroying the beauty of the city by putting gigantic billboards. An example worth quoting would be a juice and nectar brand which instead of using conventional techniques to advertise its products, put bottles around the green belts, hanging in the branches of trees. This helped in effectively engaging with the audience and yet did not cause any sight pollution. It’s about time that we stand to save our city’s beauty by ensuring that OOH advertising is being done responsibly and effectively. This will require a better understanding of the consumers by marketers so that only the defined target audience is focused upon selectively.
Again I would like to emphasize that advertisers should engage rather than bombard.